Sarah Snook’s All Her Fault: Peacock Trailer Reveals Twisted Psychological Thriller
“All Her Fault,” an original series slated to begin streaming on Peacock on November 6, will be a mystery thriller show based on a premise that has terrified us since the days when our proto-mammalian ancestors first began caring for their offspring: a child abruptly and mysteriously goes missing. This starting point is so inherently horrifying that a great mystery thriller would seem almost to write itself from there. However, the trailer for “All Her Fault,” which dropped on October 10, is intriguing for how it reveals a series that will focus less on the mystery itself than on its impact on those trying to solve it.
A Child’s Sudden Disappearance – “Not a Misunderstanding”
Trailer for All Her Fault, Courtesy of NBC/Peacock
“All Her Fault” stars Sarah Snook as Marissa Irvine, who drops her (approximately) five-year-old son Milo off at a playdate. When she returns to pick him up, the head of the household tells her, “There’s no Milo here.” Soon, she’s consulting Detective McConville (Michael Peña), who explains that most child disappearances amount to some kind of “misunderstanding” among family members and caretakers. “But Milo’s been missing for nearly five hours now,” he adds. “It’s not a misunderstanding.”
It’s unclear whether Marissa and Milo’s father, Peter (Jake Lacy), are still married, but certainly they appear united by their newfound terror. Marissa also receives support from her good friend Jenny (Dakota Fanning), among others. In the trailer’s clips of commiseration, Snook instantly sells Marissa’s sheer anguish, which becomes our own.
An Unexpected Whodunit Turn
The early portion of the trailer for “All Her Fault” is pretty standard stuff – we see Milo’s missing-child profile on a billboard, and Marissa and Peter speak at a press conference before suspicious, sensationalism-hungry reporters. Even here, however, there’s an uncommonly powerful moment, as one especially unfeeling newsperson asks: “Did you contact a publishing house? Couldn’t your current debt be offset by what you might stand to gain?” “He’s my son!” Marissa snaps furiously.
Soon thereafter, via unspecified clues and deductive logic, the police identify Milo’s kidnapper as Carrie Finch (Sophia Lillis). It’s not made clear who she is, but when Detective McConville asks for the names of everyone who may be connected with her, Marissa drops a bombshell: “You don’t understand. It was just the people in this room.”
Someone close to Marissa – possibly even Peter – is somehow involved in Milo’s abduction. Instantly, the unity among her group of friends dissolves, as she can no longer trust anyone around her. Not only is her son still missing, but now she and the members of her former de facto support group are at one another’s throats. Who among Marissa’s closest friends and loved ones had a hand in Milo’s disappearance?
Unexpected, and Unexpectedly Terrifying
This particular turn in the mystery makes “All Her Fault” appear not only unique, but uniquely horrifying. Perhaps the most chilling element of the whole trailer is the fact that the actual prospect of rescuing Milo recedes into the background by its end, as the question arises of whether Marissa and the people of her former support group will start murdering one another. It makes the situation for the child – the victim whose life is the crux of the entire storyline – feel sickeningly hopeless.
Was it part of the kidnapper’s grand plan to turn these adults against one another? Which of them (if any) were in fact involved in Milo’s abduction in the first place? Does Marissa (alongside Detective McConville, who is shown to remain a sane observer all the way to the end of the trailer) represent Milo’s last hope of rescue? In less than a month, we’ll be able to find out what answers “All Her Fault” has in store for us.
